Tree grates are widely known and used in various forms at the base of trees, particularly in urban locations where trees are planted in openings in sidewalk or promenade pavements. A tree requires a certain unpaved area at its base through which it receives water and nutrients necessary to its growth. In intensively used areas it is impractical or undesirable to leave this opening as bare earth, or covered with decorative, low vegetation. Tree grates are used in such situations to cover these openings, thereby eliminating the necessity to plant and maintain grass, ground cover or shrubbery at the tree base. The tree grates also prevent the tree well from becoming a collector of trash.
The tree grates in widest use are manufactured of cast iron. These are available with openings of a fixed size around the tree trunk, or may be obtained with openings capable of being enlarged. In the latter case, various methods of enlargement may be used. The grate may be formed of concentric sections which are bolted together in the beginning, the inner ring(s) of which may be unbolted and removed as the tree grows. Another method allows removal of inner rings by breaking radial links with hammer and chisel, or by other means.
Tree grates are also manufactured in concrete. The concrete tree grates known to the inventor, however, lack any mechanism which permits successive enlargement of the opening of the tree trunk in such a way as to be easily achieved, and which results in a neat, presentable opening of larger size which does not manifest objectionable traces of the enlarging process.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide an improved tree grate system.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a tree grate system as above which easily permits successive enlargement of the opening for the tree trunk.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide a tree grate system as above which facilitates enlargement of the opening in a way which does not manifest objectionable traces of the enlarging process.
These and other objects and advantages will become clearer from the following description and drawings in which like reference numerals depict like elements.